Purgatory Chasm
Location: Purgatory Chasm State Reservation/Sutton, Massachusetts/U.S.A
New England Wedge Tomb at Purgatory Chasm
Irish Wedge Tomb at Glenveagh
Triangular tunnel entrance
Note: The forests of Massachusetts are perhaps most well known for the prismatic foliage that unfolds during the brief and breathtaking Autumn season. What is less well known, and yet no less breathtaking, are the megalithic statements that exists deep within, and beneath, those forests. Yet another astounding example of this is “Purgatory Chasm” in the small New England town of Sutton.
It is nothing less than a miniature canyon, of all things, with thousands of free-sitting-boulders, crafted stones, Wedge Tombs, and triadically oriented alters, all carved out of solid granite. Click on the images to get a closer look. The boulders here are so massive, that gigantic fallen trees, perhaps 80 t0 100 feet tall, and 150 years old (or older), look more like young trees that have been tipped by a storm in photos. Although this area is only a 1.5 mile loop, it is a non-stop tour of inconceivable stone statements from start to finish. It’s also a fantastic chance to practice your footing and climbing for other rocky trails.
This small canyon has areas of 50 to 70 foot high granite enclosures, like solid walls shooting straight up from a bedrock floor, running about 100 feet across for just over half a mile. In this space huge White Pines, Cedars, Hemlocks, and Birches grow straight out of the rock, almost 100 feet high. Megalithic sites in New England often feature stones that have been crafted to highlight an equilateral triangular arrangement. Without seeing it, time after time, it would be very hard to believe. But again and again, stones are found to be arranged specifically to create this triangle (Pictured below). Furthermore, perfectly strong tree’s grow off the top of these arrangements. It’s as if whoever created these fixtures knew that the trees would grow on them, like grafting plants in a green house, but on a Jurassic scale, and using a “granite container”.
Certain arrangements in these stones are nearly identical to rock statements I have documented in Ireland, particularly the Wedge Tomb type. The Wedge Tomb is an arrangement where a long and flatly crafted megalithic boulder is placed specifically over a supporting “corner boulder” as a “roof piece”. A frontal boulder is then planted as a sort of “sign” beside the empty space created by the “roof” and “corner” stones. Several examples are shown here with the small Wedge Tomb in the heart of Purgatory Chasm (first two images above). There is also a distinct four-foot-high Standing Stone with three circular incisions running right through its granite face, and a small Dolmen with a perfectly triangular gap featured at its core (pictured on the left). Even the openings to the rock caverns look to have been intentionally set so the entrance-way would be a “triangular”, looking from the inside-out (Image: center/above). The area is inundated with fine golden leaves of New England Autumns past, giving this pathway a unique luster that hikers will rarely find anywhere else. Seek it out:)
